I will admit upfront, this film left a really horrible taste in my mouth.
So much so that it even soured my feelings towards Nerdist and Chris Hardwick.
I know his M.O. is to be very positive about everything, and upbeat. But this movie just wasn't good.
If you are giving it a HUGE pass because it is low-budget, maybe you could forgive it some of its mistakes.
I was ready to walk out after 10 minutes because of a sound design element that was quite literally painful. From Bravest Warriors: "It's like making Oatmeal cry..." Catbug:"Why would you do that?" Why would you hurt your audience? That is lazy filmmaking.
All of the characters were unlikeable bullies. I rooted for no one and wanted them all to die.
The visual design was for stylistic purposes and actually violated filmic grammar in ways I just could not forgive.
Blacklight? Why? Totally non-diegetic, which is fine, but could not forgive it especially compared to other issues.
Oh, let me do First Person POV shots as Over-The-Shoulder shots, SOMETIMES. Why? I'm confused.
Let me have blinking lights/strobe effect FOR NO REASON, other than to make the shot painful to look at. Thanks.
The love story didn't really work for me either. There was ONE SCENE where it was almost poignant (the one with the strobe lights), but I didn't even want to watch it because the cinematography was so annoying.
Nor did I find the gore effects particularly interesting either.
I didn't like the movie. I didn't enjoy watching it. I didn't like the score (which was also a major selling point of the film).
It was all over the place. And there there was weird unnecessarily sexualized slut-shaming/emasculation dialogue that I also did not like at all.
The whole big social networking allegory was also not very strong or sold well in the movie itself. You get that more from reading critique on it than what you can actually see in the film text itself.
Maybe I am too old.
I love genre movies. I love the surprise little indies.
But I was sitting in my seat fuming, just waiting for it to end. I felt lied to by the Nerdist stamp of approval.
To me it is totally skippable. Unless you are OK with starting a movie that it is OK to shut off before you finish.
Plot summary
An amnesiac must reach back into his mind for memories that will help him save the love of his life before a virus completely takes over.
Uploaded by: FREEMAN
January 08, 2024 at 09:51 AM
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Movie Reviews
I guess I am not the demographic...it made me angry.
Interesting storytelling format
Not much of horror as I had hoped. It is heavy on drama but it was quite interesting how the story was developed. There was a sort of filter on the film too, giving it a video game feel.
The movie had potential, but ended up as a less than mediocre result...
Right, well I gave "The Hive" a chance without knowing what it was, aside from it being a horror movie and having an interesting movie cover.
Turns out that director David Yarovesky didn't really tickle me in the right places with this 2014 movie. It was watchable for sure, but it was hardly an entertaining movie or a movie that I felt myself delving into as things progressed on the screen.
I will say that the special effects and the atmosphere portrayed and used in the movie were good, and they carried the movie quite the distance, because the movie was suffering from an inadequate script and plot.
The acting in the movie was fairly adequate, taking into consideration the anchor the actors and actresses had around their feet in terms of a lack of proper storyline and script. I enjoy watching a movie where the performers are unfamiliar faces, so that at least worked in favor of the movie.
I managed to sit through "The Hive" to the end, but I can't claim to have been thoroughly entertained by what I was watching. The movie is definitely watchable, but not an outstanding movie in the horror genre.
For me, at least, "The Hive" is a movie that came and went without leaving a dent or impression in anything. Actually so much that it wasn't before 5 years later after the movie was released that I came to know about it - and that was by sheer random luck. This is not a movie that warrants a second viewing by any means, because the movie just lacked the contents to support that.